HEAD COACH BILL COURTNEY
Cornell head coach Bill Courtney
is in his fourth season at Cornell (35-65, .350; 18-24 Ivy, .429) ...
Courtney became the fifth Robert E. Gallagher '44 Coach of Men's
Basketball at Cornell on April 23, 2010.

STORY LINES: Cornell
will have a chance to build some momentum heading into Ivy League play
when it closes its non-conference slate against Oberlin on Saturday,
Jan. 11 at 2 p.m. at Newman Arena. The Big Red will be attempting to
snap a 19-game losing skid and pick up its first win of the season when
it meets the Division III Yeomen from Oberlin, Ohio.

Cornell has played some good basketball despite its 0-13 start, with two
of the losses coming to 2013 NCAA Final Four squads (Syracuse,
Louisville) and six total coming at the hands of 2013 postseason squads
(Syracuse, Louisville and Notre Dame - NCAA, Stony Brook - NIT, Loyola -
CIT, Western Michigan - CBI) that went a combined 161-58. Cornell has
shown glimpses of really good play despite its heavy reliance on
underclassmen and inexperienced upperclassmen. Four of the team's top
eight scorers are freshmen or sophomores and the three top upperclassmen
had made a combined 23 career starts entering the year. The Big Red led
then-No. 8/7 Syracuse by 14 points in the first half and by six at the
break, led a Loyola (MD) team that won 23 games a year ago by seven
points with five minutes remaining and had a 19-point advantage against
Binghamton with 13 minutes left and a 10-point lead with four minutes to
play against Siena and led Western Michigan in the second half. Cornell
went on to drop all five games.

The Big Red backcourt has been its strength, with its three starting guards all averaging double figures. Sophomore guard Nolan Cressler is off to a great start for the Big Red, averaging 16.8 points and 4.8 rebounds and freshman guard Robert Hatter is at 10.5 ppg. while chipping in 2.6 assists and 2.1 rebounds. Junior Devin Cherry rounds out the trio at 10.6 ppg. to go along with 3.5 rebounds and 3.2 assists. Senior forward Dwight Tarwater
has been a double-double threat, posting 6.8 points and 6.5 rebounds
per night and pacing the team and ranking among the Ivy League leaders
in offensive rebounds (2.6 per game). Freshman Robert Onuorah (3.1 ppg.,
3.2 rpg., 0.7 bpg.) and junior Deion Giddens (4.1 ppg., 3.5 rpg., 0.8 bpg.) are holding down the middle, while senior guard Dominick Scelfo (3.7 ppg., 1.0 apg.) and freshman guard Darryl Smith
(3.8 ppg., 2.1 rpg.) are providing firepower off the bench. The Big Red
is scoring 65.4 points on 42 percent shooting and has a neutral
assist:turnover ratio. Much of Cornell's troubles have come on the
defensive end, where the team is allowing 83.2 points on 49 percent
shooting, including 42 percent from 3-point range.

Oberlin is 4-2 in its last six games after opening the year with five
consecutive losses, including hitting the 90-point mark twice. The team
was set to visit Grove City College on Wednesday before heading to
Ithaca to meet the Big Red. Senior swingman Geoff Simpson is averaging a
team-high 16.5 ppg. and adds 6.2 rpg. and 2.9 apg., while shooting 51
percent from the floor and 40 percent from 3-point range. Sophomore
Randy Ollie, a 6-9 post player, is the team's other double figure scorer
at 10.9 ppg. along with a team-best 8.5 rpg. and 1.5 bpg. In all, eight
regulars are averaging at least 6.0 points per game. Oberlin is
shooting 47 percent from the floor and connecting on 38 percent from
3-point range as a team and is outrebounding its opponents by more than
two per game. Seventh-year head coach Isaiah Cavaco, a former player at
Cornell's Ivy League rival Yale, guided the team to a 7-19 record a year
ago.

The teams don't have any recent history together, though the programs
have met four times on the hardwood — the last time during the 1916-17
season, nearly 100 years ago. The Big Red won three of those four
previous matchups, including each of the last three. The Yeomen will be
looking for its their win over Cornell in 104 years, a 23-19 triumph on
Feb. 11, 1910.

A WIN OVER OBERLIN WOULD:
• avoid the Big Red's first 0-14 start to a season in program history.
• snap a 19-game losing streak dating back to last season, the longest in school history and the longest skid in Division I.
• end a nine-game home skid.
• extend Cornell's advantage in the series record against Oberlin to 4-1.
• be the 21st straight win over a non-Division I team for the Big Red over the last 21 seasons.
• be the 1,210th in program history (1,209-1,339 in 114 seasons).

ABOUT OBERLIN:
• Oberlin is 4-7 on the season but has turned its season around after an
0-5 start, going 4-2 in its last six and winning three of its last four
overall.
• The Yeomen had a midweek contest at Grove City College on Wednesday before heading to Ithaca.
• Senior swingman Geoff Simpson is averaging a team-high 16.5 ppg. and
adds 6.2 rpg. and 2.9 apg., while shooting 51 percent from the floor and
40 percent from 3-point range. The 6-5 Simpson entered Wednesday's game
just two points shy of 1,000 for his career.
• Sophomore Randy Ollie, a 6-9 post player, is the team's other double
figure scorer at 10.9 ppg. along with a team-best 8.5 rpg. and 1.5 bpg.
• In all, eight regulars are averaging at least 6.0 points per game.
• Oberlin is shooting 47 percent from the floor and connecting on 38
percent from 3-point range as a team and is outrebounding its opponents
by more than two per game.
• Head coach Isaiah Cavaco has done good work in his seven seasons at
Oberlin, including guiding the program to its first NCAC tournament in a
decade and setting a program record for scoring defense a season ago.
He played collegiately and lettered four seasons at Yale.

THE CORNELL-OBERLIN SERIES:
• Cornell leads the all-time series 3-1 dating all the way back to the 1909-10 season.
• The Big Red earned victories in 1912-13, 1915-16 and 1916-17, all of which were played in Ithaca.
• The teams first met on Feb. 11, 1910, a 23-19 Oberlin victory.

CORNELL VS. NON-DIVISION I OPPONENTS:
• Cornell has almost annually played and beaten a non-Division I team,
going 20-0 with an average margin of victory of more than 30 points per
game in the last 21 seasons.
• The 2010-11 season was the only year in the last 20 seasons where the schedule was made up completely of Division I teams.
• Each of the team's 20 wins came by double figures except for in
2004-05, when Ithaca College made a 10-point run against Cornell
reserves in the final minute in a 69-67 Big Red victory.
• The Big Red is 155-61 against teams that are non-Division I foes after last year's 103-84 win over Old Westbury.

NOTES TO KNOW:
• Cornell has increased its win totals in each of the last two seasons under head coach Bill Courtney,
from 10 in 2010-11 after graduating eight seniors from the previous
year's NCAA Sweet 16 team, to 12 in 2011-12 to 13 a year ago.
• Cornell's 13 opponents have a combined 100-79 (.559) record and six of
the teams have already captured at least nine wins on the year.
• The Big Red brings a 19-game losing streak into the contest, its longest in school history and the longest in Division I.
• In the Big Red's five home games, Cornell is shooting 46 percent from
the floor and has 71 assists to just 48 turnovers, but has attempted 66
fewer free throws than its opponents.
• Sophomore Nolan Cressler has scored at least 17 points in four of his last six games, including a career-high 27 points at Western Michigan.
• Junior Devin Cherry has hit for double figures in four consecutive games, averaging 14.3 points over that span.
• Big Red players have already missed 20 games already this season due to injury.

HOW TO FOLLOW CORNELL:
• There are numerous way to follow the Big Red through the 203-14 basketball season.
• Men's basketball games will be broadcast on HITS 103.3 FM for the
2013-14 season. Longtime voice of the Big Red Barry Leonard returns on
the call with the play-by-play, while former All-Ivy center Eric
Taylor'05 is on board to do color analysis.
• A half-hour pregame show and postgame analysis will enable Big Red fans to follow Coach Bill Courtney's team throughout the season.
• The audio of all games will also be available as part of the IvyLeagueDigitalNetwork subscription service.
• The Big Red's home contests will all be broadcast live with streaming
video as part of the IvyLeagueDigitalNetwork subscription service. Visit
www.IvyLeagueDigitalNetwork.com for all the latest information on
Cornell broadcasts.
• Cornell will use SIDEARM Live Stats for each of the Big Red's home
games in 2013-14. Visit www.CornellBigRed.com for all of the official
statistics.
• You can follow the team on YouTube, Facebook and Twitter. Highlights,
interviews and features on all 36 of Cornell's varsity sports can be
found at www.youtube.com/cornellathletics,
www.facebook.com/cornellathletics or www.twitter.com/cornellsports.

NEXT UP:
• The Big Red opens Ivy League play when it visits Columbia on Saturday, Jan. 18 at 7 p.m. at Levien Gymnasium in New York, N.Y.
• Columbia leads the all-time series between the programs 122-98, though
Cornell has won 16 of the last 22 meetings between the squads.